Have travelled with them a couple of times on tours. More often that not you are travelling on the same coach as Cosmos customers with the same rep. The only difference is that sometimes the hotels you stop at are different. The Cosmos folks will end up in a hotel in the centre of a town. As an Archers customer you end up at a smaller cheaper one on the outskirts.
If you're fussed about such things, check carefully where you'll be staying - if not, just sit back and think how much more the Cosmos folks paid for the same holiday as you.

We had to remind Archers to send the holiday documents. They were finally received only 4 days before departure!
We had booked a resort holiday in Montecatini (travel via Venice Airport). When we checked in at the UK airport we were informed that the flight was cancelled and substituted with one that did not provide in flight catering. It was late departing. In Italy during transfer to the Venice hotel we were informed that the accommodation was replaced by a poor quality substitute. We too were disappointed with the hotel in Venice and had poor quality and insufficient food provided. Day two on arrival at Montecatini, we were informed that only 12 of the 34 people on our coach, would get rooms in the booked accommodation. The rest would still have to take meals in the booked hotel, but would sleep in another hotel, a walk away. This would continue until rooms became available in the booked hotel. During the next few days we had room and hotel changes twice a day until we were finally settled. Thus creating major problems for anyone disabled. We had all paid a premium price for the booked hotel, as it was billed as “superior.” NOTE: Wallace Arnold travellers who arrived at Monticatini 20 mins after us, were all allocated rooms in the hotel ! There were problems with the quality of the rooms and health and safety issues in the hotel (supposedly a 4 star) which were ignored when reported. The hotel reception staff had no interest in providing customer satisfaction. Complaints to Archers resort manager were a waste of our time! Even the additional booked outings did not go without fault. But it’s a long distressing story. We did not get a holiday in our opinion,and were glad to get back to the UK.

Even seasoned Archers travellers in the group said they would never use Archers again after this experience.

A complaint to Archers office on our return was initially ignored, until we threatened further action – their final response was to offer a £100 voucher, to use against another Archers holiday, “to give them another chance,”
(I don’t think so do you?). Further action is now underway to secure a full refund.

We went to Egypt with Cosmos, and found that people on precisely the same Nile Cruise had paid considerably less for the identical holiday. I suggest you have a look in the Cosmos brochure and see if the same hotels appear.

Me and my lovely wife are looking at booking a holiday of a lifetime to China. We have seen just what we want (The Middle Kingdom tour including Yangtze cruise) with this company but do not know much about them.

Can anyone give me some feedback on this company - good or bad as I do not want to part with all my hard earned cash if they are no good.

Also, any recommendations for travel in China or other companies much appreciated

Archers are owned by Cosmos holidays who specialise in Touring and Specialist holidays. You can also try Hayes and Jarvis, Virgin, Kuoni or try your local travel agencies as many have staff that are dedicated to certain areas of travel as they have travlled there extensivley.

Like previous posts have mentioned, they're part of the huge Cosmos / Globus Group.

I've been on three holidays with them (in fact, I've just returned from their Hawaiian Islands tour), and every one has been FANTASTIC. They use local tour guides and the organisation on the tour is second to none.

Just a couple of things to bear in mind:

- The admin staff in the UK could do with some customer serivce training
- They do tend to stay in fairly basic / budget hotels.

I travelled with Archers Direct this year after having trouble with Tulip holidays (yes, sorry Tulip again).

They helped me and advised me what to do after paying a deposit for a holiday which turned out to be several hundred pounds more than the original quote, and even allowed me to change my holiday booking with them to another country after I was threatened by the above mentioned Tulip holidays, thank you Kane,

I hope this sets your minds at rest about booking with Archers Direct.

Steveh...I had a fantastic tour of China with a Yangtse Cruise in 2004. Went with Travelsphere and I would highly recommend them. Everything went like clockwork, the hotels were really good. The people, brilliant. It's a wonderful country, so much to see...enjoy,
Yours Aye, jopa

We did the Rocky Mountaineer in May this year. Fantastic country, fantastic trip. We went with Jet Save which is part of Thomson. It was fab and well organised and the accommodation was suitable for the price we paid.

As you can imagine when you are on the Rocky Mountaineer you meet other tour groups. In our carriage was Cosmostourama (whose rep was brillant). Comsostourama is part of the Cosmos group. Archers is the "cheaper" version of Cosmostourama however they all travelled in one group on this tour. Normally Archers have slightly cheaper accommodation.

All I can say is that the tour is fantastic, hotels may be basic but who cares you are not spending much time apart from sleeping in them. We did the 10 days and are definately going back.

One tip if you collect tesco vouchers you can use them towards the cost of a cosmostourama trip. A £2.50 brochure is worth £10.00 towards a holiday.

I did this exact tour in July. I had booked a premier tour departing East Midlands on 17th. About a week before I was due to pay I had a letter to saymy holiday had been changed to the 24th flying from Manchester at 6.30am. I was offered a refund but as I had been looking foreward to my holiday I opted to go. This cost me extra in petrol to get to Manchester also car parking for 2 weeks. There were only 27 people on the coach tour and many of them had had their dates changed.

On the plus side the tour was fantastic we saw some wonderful sights and being the premier tour the hotels were very good.

Hi
I have just been looking round for my holiday in Sept to Turkey and have found a company called Archers Direct, the price comes out at 215 pounds cheaper than Thomas cook. Wondered if anyone has used them before, any help would be appreciated.

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